I hear you!  I am trying to design a biplane with hard wings, and have learned from sad experience to work out all the problems before starting the actual project.

Jerry, " I am hoping that batteries get a lot better, cheaper, and lighter.  I think most of my troubles while cruising can be traced back to the diesel or the outboard in the dinghy, it would be nice to go all electric."

I am planning the hybrid route, wings, diesel and electric (belt suspenders and life-raft).  For the electric portion I plan to put an electric motor on the shaft from the diesel engine to the prop, kind of like a pony motor.  Then I can potentially drive the boat with it or make power when I am motoring or sailing.

My eye opener with the solar system was that my solar panels charged the batteries too quickly in sunny days and not enough in cloudy days and there were way too many short, cloudy days. It works well enough for the household stuff, tv, microwave, lights, etc. but driving the boat is a whole other story.

Except that on a nice calm sunny afternoon if I wanted to swap anchorages it would be nice to putter to the next anchorage silently.  Of if my fuel filters clogged at an inopportune time it would be nice to power it electrically or when docking, or anchoring if I didn't want to start up the diesels.  And it shouldn't cost much if designed in from the start.

Talador